Buyer Guide: Hikvision IP Cameras vs. Dahua IP Cameras

Hikvision and Dahua are two of the most popular IP cameras brands in the world. But how to choose a suitable one among them?

Let’s discuss.

Hikvision is a leading supplier of surveillance products in China, committed to continuously improving video processing technology and video analysis technology, providing leading surveillance products, technical solutions and professional quality services to the world, continuously creating maximum value for customers. Hikvision’s marketing and service network covers the world. Currently, it has established branches in 33 cities in mainland China. It has also established wholly-owned and joint venture subsidiaries in Hong Kong, Los Angeles, and India, and is preparing to build more branches globally. Institutions to provide customers with fast and high-quality services.

Hikvision’s traditional business is the construction of government and enterprise-level security systems, especially the cooperation of transportation departments, which makes Hikvision’s technical strength in AI recognition very prominent.

In recent years, in accordance with the urgent needs of the retail industry for customer behavior analysis, big data solutions based on security cameras have become Hikvision ‘s innate advantages.

Many companies are engaged in research in this area, such as Huina Technology. However, compared with Hikvision, it lacks basic hardware support. Hikvision often installs cameras to send solutions, basic versions, and trial versions to attract customers and finally achieve full promotion.

Although the development of these new businesses is progressing rapidly, as a listed company with a revenue of 50 billion, it is still more difficult to achieve a breakthrough in revenue quickly. Therefore, the company’s main source of revenue is the traditional camera field.

Dahua is a leading video surveillance product supplier and solution service provider, providing a series of leading video storage, front-end, display control and intelligent transportation products to the world. Since the company launched the industry’s first self-developed 8-channel embedded DVR in 2002, it has continued to increase R&D investment and continue to devote itself to technological innovation. Nearly 10% of sales revenue is invested in research and development every year, and now has a research and development technical team of more than 3,000 people.

Dahua hard disk video recorder is currently one of the most technologically advanced brands in the domestic video recorder field. It uses an industrial-grade embedded microcontroller as the main processor of the video recorder, uses an embedded LINUX operating system, supports simultaneous multi-channel recording, simultaneous video playback and simultaneous recording Network customization operation; 16-bit true color graphical menu operation interface is adopted, and mouse operation is supported at the same time with menu annotations. Moreover, it can be found that the price of Dahua hard disk video recorder is not very high at the same level, but its quality is leading, and the price-performance ratio is very good.

Here we recommend some hot model comparisons.

Table 1. IP Cameras – Bullet

Brand	Hikvision	Dahua
Model	DS-2CD2043G2-I	IPC-HFW5442E-ZE
Price	$245	$188
Product line	Pro Series (EasyIP)	WizMind Series
Resolution	4MP (2688 × 1520)	4MP (2688 × 1520)
Sensor	1/3″ Progressive Scan CMOS	1/1.8″ 4Megapixel progressive scan CMOS
Lens	2.8 mm, horizontal FOV 103°, vertical FOV 55°, diagonal FOV 122°	2.7 mm–12.0 mm Motorized vari-focal, horizontal FOV : 114°–47°, vertical FOV: 62°–26°
Day/Night	Auto(ICR), Schedule	Auto(ICR)/Color/B/W
IR Range	Up to 40m	Up to 50m
WDR	120dB	140dB
Summary	Both good for human and vehicle targets classification. Dahua wins in price and lens.

Table 2. IP Cameras – Dome

Brand	Hikvision	Dahua
Model	DS-2CD2143G0-IS	IPC-HDBW2431E-S-S2
Price	$114	$60
Product line	Pro Series (EasyIP)	Lite Series
Resolution	4MP (2688 × 1520)	4MP (2688 × 1520)
Sensor	1/3″ Progressive Scan CMOS	1/3″ 4Megapixel progressive CMOS
Lens	2.8 mm: Horizontal 103.0° × Vertical 58.0° × Diagonal 123.0°	2.8 mm: Horizontal 102.0° × Vertical 55.0° × Diagonal 121.0°
Day/Night	Auto/Schedule/Triggered by Alarm In (-S)	Auto(ICR)/Color/B/W
IR Range	Up to 30m	Up to 30m
WDR	120dB	120dB
Summary	Main specs are almost same. Dahua wins in price.

Table 3. Hot IP Cameras Recommendations

Brand	Model	Resolution	Case Type
Hikvision	DS-2CD2043G2-I	4MP	Bullet
	DS-2CD2143G0-I	4MP	Dome
	DS-2CD2087G2-LU	8MP	Bullet
	DS-2CD2086G2-IU	8MP	Bullet
	DS-2CD2383G0-IU	8MP	Dome
	DS-2CD2385G1-I	8MP	Turret
	DS-2CD2T85G1-I8	8MP	Turret
	DS-2CV2046G0-IDW	4MP	WiFi Dome
	DS-2DE2A404IW-DE3/W	4MP	PTZ Dome
Dahua	IPC-HFW1230S-S5	2MP	Bullet
	IPC-HDBW2431E-S-S2	4MP	Dome
	IPC-HDW2831T-AS-S2	8MP	Eyeball
	IPC-HFW3449E-AS-LED	4MP	Bullet
	IPC-HDBW3449E-AS-NI	4MP	Bullet
	IPC-HDW5241TM-AS-LED	4MP	Eyeball
	IPC-EW5541-AS	5MP	Fisheye
	SD1A404XB-GNR	4MP	PTZ Dome